United States v. James Travis Buckley

586 F.2d 498, 43 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 761, 1978 U.S. App. LEXIS 6933
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedDecember 18, 1978
Docket77-5449
StatusPublished
Cited by124 cases

This text of 586 F.2d 498 (United States v. James Travis Buckley) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. James Travis Buckley, 586 F.2d 498, 43 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 761, 1978 U.S. App. LEXIS 6933 (5th Cir. 1978).

Opinion

JAMES C. HILL, Circuit Judge:

Appellant James Travis Buckley, an attorney, was charged in an eight-count indictment with violating two sections of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954. The indictment charged Buckley with three counts of attempted tax evasion under 26 U.S.C.A. § 7201 and five counts for failure to file a return under 26 U.S.C.A. § 7203, all allegedly occurring during a five-year period from 1970 through 1974. Following a six-day trial in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi, the jury, after two hours of deliberation, returned a verdict of guilty on each of the eight counts of the indictment. On appeal Buckley challenges, inter alia, the validity of his convictions for failure to file in the years in which he was also convicted for attempted tax evasion. Because we agree with appellant on this point, we modify the decision below by vacating the convictions and sentences for failure to file in 1970, 1973 and 1974; otherwise, we affirm.

I. Entrapment

Buckley raised an “entrapment” defense at trial consisting of testimony by him and his friends to the effect that the F.B.I. was engaged in a plot to see him “behind bars.” Buckley asserted that he had incurred the ire of the F.B.I. by representing several of the criminal defendants in a trial arising out of the fire bombing death of Vernon Dahmer, the Hattiesburg, Mississippi, civil rights leader, and by his representation of numerous other defendants in cases where he had had occasion to cross-examine F.B.I. agents. Appellant’s friends testified that they had overheard remarks made by F.B.I. agents to Buckley stating that “we will get you one way or the other.” Buckley himself testified that an I.R.S. agent had visited him in 1966 in connection with an audit of his return and warned him that the F.B.I. was “out to get him” regardless of whether he filed or not. Numerous acts of harassment were also alleged. As a result of his conversation with the I.R.S. agent and his experiences with the F.B.I., Buckley testified that he failed to file income tax *501 returns because he was afraid that if he were to file he would be indicted with fabricated charges of filing fraudulent returns, a felony. 1 Choosing the lesser of two evils, then, he elected not to file, knowing it to be punishable only as a misdemeanor. Arguing that the above evidence was sufficient to raise the issue of entrapment, appellant now contends that the trial court erred in refusing to instruct the jury on the defense of entrapment.

Appellant is certainly correct in asserting that the issue of entrapment is for the jury to decide, assuming it is properly raised. United States v. Benavidez, 558 F.2d 308, 310 (5th Cir. 1977); United States v. Harrell, 436 F.2d 606, 612 (5th Cir. 1970); Pierce v. United States, 414 F.2d 163 (5th Cir.), cert, denied, 396 U.S. 960, 90 S.Ct. 435, 24 L.Ed.2d 425 (1969). Nonetheless, in order to raise the issue, the initial burden of going forward with the evidence lies with the defendant; he must produce “some evidence, but more than a scintilla,” raising the defense. United States v. Groessel, 440 F.2d 602, 606 (5th Cir.), cert, denied, 403 U.S. 933, 91 S.Ct. 2263, 29 L.Ed.2d 713 (1971). See also United States v. Benavidez, 558 F.2d 308 (5th Cir. 1977); United States v. Harper, 505 F.2d 924 (5th Cir. 1974). Once the defendant has discharged this obligation, the prosecution must ultimately prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was not entrapped into committing the offense. United States v. Benavidez, 558 F.2d 308, 310 (5th Cir. 1977); United States v. Harrell, 436 F.2d 606, 612 (5th Cir. 1970). If the defendant fails to carry his burden of going forward with the evidence, however, he is not entitled to have the jury consider the defense of entrapment. United States v. Harper, 505 F.2d 924, 926 (5th Cir. 1974); United States v. Groessel, 440 F.2d 602, 606 (5th Cir.), cert, denied, 408 U.S. 933, 91 S.Ct. 2263, 29 L.Ed.2d 713 (1971).

Entrapment occurs “when the criminal design originates with the officials of the government, and they implant in the mind of an innocent person the disposition to commit the alleged offense and induce its commission in order that they may prosecute.” Sorrells v. United States, 287 U.S. 435, 442, 53 S.Ct. 210, 213, 77 L.Ed. 413 (1932). See also United States v. Russell, 411 U.S. 423, 434-35, 93 S.Ct. 1637, 36 L.Ed.2d 366 (1973); Sherman v. United States, 356 U.S. 369, 372, 78 S.Ct. 819, 2 L.Ed.2d 848 (1958); United States v. Costello, 483 F.2d 1366, 1367 (5th Cir. 1973); United States v. Groessel, 440 F.2d 602, 605 (5th Cir.), cert, denied, 403 U.S. 933, 91 S.Ct. 2263, 29 L.Ed.2d 713 (1971). Although Buckley’s story was vigorously denied by the government at trial, 2 we nonetheless accept it as true for the purposes of deciding this issue. And even assuming Buckley’s allegations to be true, the evidence does not raise the defense of entrapment.

It is clear from the evidence that the criminal intent did not originate with the government, but instead formed within the defendant’s own mind, in response to an alleged plot by the F.B.I. to see him incarcerated. As Buckley testified:

In 1966 in my office in Bay Springs, Mississippi an agent of the Internal Revenue visited me and audited my books and papers and accounts and then later came to my house ... I don’t know the man’s name and I don’t know if I knew it then, but there were actually two differ *502 ent ones visited me at different time[s], but one of them told me then and told me at my home later, said, that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is after you and he gave me this and told me it was a friendly advice and a friendly warning, he said, ‘they will get you one way or the other and I am telling you this as a matter of trying to help you and trying to advise you to be on the alert.’ And he said, T know them well enough to know that it does not make any difference whether you file or not, if they can get you,’ but he said, ‘I’m not telling you not to file and I’m not telling you to file, but you know the penalties for not filing,’ and he said, ‘I’m under an obligation to advise you that the law requires that you file.’

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
586 F.2d 498, 43 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 761, 1978 U.S. App. LEXIS 6933, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-james-travis-buckley-ca5-1978.